


It's Funny

by EndlessRain



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Episode Related, Fluff, Love, M/M, POV Second Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-23
Updated: 2013-08-23
Packaged: 2017-12-24 09:24:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/938294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EndlessRain/pseuds/EndlessRain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sitting under the Arby’s sign on the back of your old beat-up Chevy, your hand on his knee, his head on your shoulder and arm wrapped around yours, you realized that you were in love with Night Vale.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's Funny

Sitting under the Arby’s sign on the back of your old beat-up Chevy, your hand on his knee, his head on your shoulder and arm wrapped around yours, you realized that you were in love with Night Vale. 

This weird, fucked up town, which you were only supposed to spend about a month at, well, as Cecil had said, you’d been here for a year. 

Your sister called you last week, and she asked when you were going to finish up with your little trip and finally come home, and you had rolled your eyes and told her that you still had much to do. 

“Like what, Carlos? I thought you were just down there to measure shadows and collect dirt. I mean, you’re in the desert in some town literally no one’s ever heard of.”

Your first instinct was to tell her that Night Vale was not just “some town”, that it was a very nice place, once you got past the feeling that death was always around the corner. 

It occurred to you that you should probably be a little bit concerned that you had mentally described Night Vale as “a very nice place”, and that you had in fact, gotten past the feeling that death was always around the corner. Huh. 

“Are you seeing someone down there? Are you having an exotic love affair with a desert person, is that it?”

You rolled your eyes again. Of course the only real reason that she called was to discuss your love life. She was always a busy-body at heart. 

“Daya, I’m not seeing anyone.”

“You are!” she screeched, and you wondered why she always had to bother you about these sorts of things, and never your brother. 

“Not… not exactly.” You admitted. You weren’t seeing him; he just sort of talked about you on the radio a lot, and thought he was cute.

“Not Facebook official?” She asked, sympathetically.

“No… more like he’s in love with me, and I’m not even sure if I like him.”

Daya laughed and you decided that you would keep her as a sister, after all. “Oh Carlos, you do. I can tell these things.”

You rolled your eyes, for the third time, and were thankful that eye rolling hasn’t been banned by the City Council. 

“Oh, god.” You said.

“What? What’s wrong?”

“I just realized that I’m an actual citizen of Night Vale.”

 

You really, really, really did not want to go to the Desert Flower Bowling Alley and Arcade Fun Complex with your coworkers for three reasons:

One, people still fucking believed that there was a giant town underneath lane five, for fuck’s sake.

Two, Cecil had texted you eleven different times about some ceremony commemorating the fact that yes, you’re actually crazy enough to have been here for a year, and you were a little more than interested in what that actually would entail.

( _Carlos, I know you’re probably quite busy with your important science and all, but next week in the anniversary of your arrival in this small yet beautiful town, and I am formally inviting you to a ceremony I will be putting on, on my show, to celebrate. Love, Cecil_ )

( _Carlos, I know that you said you weren’t sure if you could make it, but I had a small token of our gratitude made for you, a trophy, if you will, but you can only have it if you come to the ceremony in two days. Love, Cecil_ ) 

( _Carlos, if you are unavailable to attend, which I totally understand as you a very busy and important man, please let me know so that I can mail your trophy to your home. Love, Cecil_ )

And three, which was absolutely the most important, you didn’t actually want to spend more time than necessary with your coworkers, because they wouldn’t shut up about this whole mess. 

Every day, you’d come into the lab and everyone would give you a shit-eating grin and ask “how’s Cecil?” and “do I hear wedding bells?” Yes, you get it; the guy on the radio is in love with you, now can we all just stop talking about it? 

At this point, you’re not even sure if they’re teasing you because they think that the whole situation is hilarious, or because they think you’re actually in a relationship with the guy. 

You’re not sure either.

Anyways, you didn’t want to go to the damn bowling alley, but there you were, with four of your team mates, bowling. 

You were pretty sure that your bowling ball had a real mermaid trapped inside.

But then everyone was crowded around lane five, holding guns and battle axes and swords, and chanting battle cries. You weren’t going to get involved this time because _Jesus_ these people were just ridiculous. You just wanted to finish up the game, and then maybe stop by the  
Night Vale Community Radio Station and pick up a trophy. 

If you had time. 

But no, suddenly there you were, marching over to lane five and proclaiming that you were going to solve this once and for all.

Aaaaand of course there’s a damn miniature city.

Of fucking course. Where did it even come from? Were they humans who had shrunk? Or was everyone else just humans who had grown? Why were you more intrigued than alarmed?

And then you had to go and bring everyone else back down with you because it was a _miracle_ , you had to share it, even if it was with people who witnessed more miracles every day than most places saw in a lifetime. 

The next thing you knew, you were getting shot down, and the last thing you remember thinking was that you weren’t going to get that trophy from Cecil after all, because you can’t own trophies when you’re dead. How disappointing. 

When you came to, you were told that the Appache Indian Tracker had saved your life, but died in the process, and your first thought was, isn’t that the guy who Cecil always complains about being racist?

So then you just had to see him. Cecil, that is. After everything that had happened, after almost fucking dying, _again_ , all you wanted to do was just see Cecil. 

You told him this, and when he sighed, you thought that it was perhaps the sweetest thing you’ve ever heard.

You sat on top of your old, beat-up Chevy, and realized that you were in love with Night Vale. 

You had to be, otherwise you would have left a long time ago, right? 100% of your experiments and tests and data came up to absolute nonsense. Even your damn calculator that you always keep in your lab coat pocket only calculates _colors_ now. So why haven’t you thrown it away? It’s obviously broken. But no, you put it in your lab coat pocket every morning, even if you only get 1+1=purple these days. 

After Arby’s you decided that if you were going to stay in this godforsaken town, you might as well go ahead and ask him out. It’s not like you had anything better to do.

You knew that he was in love with you; you’d heard him say it over and over again on public radio for the last year. He called you _Perfect_ Carlos, and _My_ Carlos, and so it wasn’t like he was going to turn you down. Right?

So why were you so nervous? What would you even say to him? Every other time you had talked to him, outside of the Arby’s parking lot, you had blown him off, saying “I’m not calling for personal reasons” or “I’m only calling because I think the world is ending. Again.” Which, to be fair, were all true at the time.

It’s not that you had disliked Cecil, it’s just that you were really worried about the state of Night Vale, and it’s strange reality. You wonder if all it took was getting used to Night Vale for you to realize that maybe he wasn’t just the weird guy on the radio. Maybe it was because Cecil _was_ Night Vale, like the two came as package deal. 

But you digress. How could you possibly ask someone out after all of that? But it was too late, because your shaky sweaty fingers betrayed you, and dialed him before you could tell them no, and you were listening to the ringing of his phone.

“Why hello Carlos! What can I inform my listeners about today?” 

Goddammit. He was always so nice and sincere. It was entirely unnecessary. 

“I… I uh, shit. _I’m calling for personal reasons._ ” You muttered. 

“Oh?” he asked.

“And um. Also. My calculations show a strange source of energy approaching the town, but not emanating the kind of light, that such a source should.” You rattled off, glancing at your notes. What the fuck were you doing? 

“Oh! Well, I’ll be sure to let the good people of Night Vale know. Thank you, Carlos.” It sounded like a goodbye, and you panicked. 

“Don’t hang up Cecil!”

“I wasn’t going to; I was going to wait for you to hang up, after you tell me not to send you poetry over text message.” He responded coolly, and you wondered why you ever thought you didn’t have time for him.

“I am also calling for personal reasons.” You repeated, dumbly. 

“I know that, you said that when I answered.”

“What are you doing tomorrow?” you asked, before you threw up. 

Cecil hummed and hawed for a few moments, saying “Oh, I don’t know, counting my sweaters, and possibly marching around my home madly, as if I am being watched.”

“Well, you shouldn’t do that.” You huffed, grimacing at your own words.

“Why is that?” Cecil asked, his voice in his radio mode, and you wondered if he was trying to interview you.

“I was uh, I was hoping that you would let me take you out on a date? Maybe?” you squeaked, and you were sure that you had never sounded more idiotic. 

But Cecil practically squealed, and you could hear him beam through the phone. “Oh, _Carlos_ , that sounds wonderful! Much better than counting sweaters or marching madly! I would love to!”

You breathed a sigh of relief. Of course he was going to say yes, why were you nervous?  
Before you could say anything else, Cecil jumped in. “Okay Carlos, I will take you on a date! I’ll pick you up at 5:30 at the lab, does that work?”

You muttered out a sure, and then hung up. You were pretty sure that _you_ were the one asking _him_ out, but somehow it turned out the other way. 

You watched a spider crawl across the wall, and you briefly wondered if Old Woman Josie was still collecting them for her angel friends to eat. Then you wondered what Cecil would wear tomorrow night, and if you would remember to take off the lab coat before he picked you up.  
Probably not. 

Oh yes, you were definitely in love with Night Vale. 

How funny.

**Author's Note:**

> khoshekhcarlos.tumblr.com


End file.
